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ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (Reuters) - Republican presidential hopeful John McCain sharply criticized the flagging U.S. war effort in Afghanistan on Tuesday and vowed to turn it around if elected, starting with sending more U.S. troops. "That's no way to run a war," said McCain, complaining that security in Afghanistan has deteriorated and the status quo is not acceptable. McCain waded into the debate over what to do in Afghanistan, a war begun after the September 11 attacks that Democrats charge has been neglected by the Bush administration as it concentrates on Iraq. An attack on a U.S. base near the...

WASHINGTON – Sen. John McCain called Monday for reductions in carbon emissions and criticized the Bush administration for failing to lead the fight against climate change. "We have many advantages in the fight against global warming, but time is not one of them. … We stand warned by serious and credible scientists across the world that time is short and the dangers are great," the Arizona Republican said in a speech delivered at a wind-energy facility in Portland, Ore. "The most relevant question is whether our own government is equal to the challenge." McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, proposed...

CHICAGO - Democratic Sen. Barack Obama said Thursday that Sen. John McCain reversed his position on President Bush's deep tax cuts in order to win the Republican presidential nomination, one of his sharpest criticisms yet of the Arizona senator he hopes to face this fall. Criticizing GOP efforts to extend major tax cuts from Bush's first term and to eliminate the estate tax, Obama said: "These are all steps that John McCain rightly said were irresponsible when they first came up." "He made a decision to reverse himself on that," Obama told reporters as he flew from Chicago to Washington...

NEW YORK - Republican John McCain assailed Mitt Romney's conservative credentials on the eve of the Super Tuesday presidential primaries, going on national television with a new campaign ad that claims Romney "was against Ronald Reagan before he was for him." McCain had eased up on his criticism of the former Massachusetts governor since winning the primary in Florida last week and had begun acting like a general election candidate, focusing his harsh rhetoric on Democratic rivals Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama. But with hours to go before voting began in more than 20 states from coast to coast,...

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina - Argentina's Congress criticized the United States on Wednesday over an alleged cover-up involving a cash-stuffed suitcase that U.S. prosecutors say was bound for President Cristina Fernandez's campaign. U.S. prosecutors say a Venezuelan-American man who brought $800,000 to Argentina for Fernandez's campaign was offered $2 million by Venezuelan agents to keep quiet and help cover up the source of the money. Fernandez describes herself as the victim of dirty politics by the U.S. intended to undermine Argentina's relationship with Venezuela. But the U.S. insists its prosecutors act independently and have pursued the case without influence from the...

The state auditor is criticizing the California State University's practice of giving large salary increases to top executives and awarding outgoing administrators hefty paychecks for doing almost no work. The audit urges the CSU board of trustees to change its policies. It says some administrators benefited from questionable compensation, moving reimbursements and deals to purchase homes near universities. State lawmakers sought the audit after media reports that the trustees gave more than $4 million to departing executives over 10 years - despite their doing little work. Trustees defended the CSU's compensation practices by saying they are needed to attract the...

AIKEN, S.C. - White House hopeful Barack Obama on Saturday said private security contractors in Iraq are raising the risk for U.S. troops because Iraqis don't distinguish between the forces. He also criticized the pay disparity between soldiers and private contractors. "You've got young men and women signing up to serve, willing to spill blood for America. How could they be treated less well than private contractors?" Obama told a crowd of more than 1,400 at a high school gymnasium in this early voting state. "And these private contractors, they go out and they're spraying bullets and hitting civilians and...

CAIRO, Egypt - An al-Qaida commander who escaped from a U.S. prison in Afghanistan appeared in a new videotape Sunday criticizing Hamas and other Islamic groups that he said prioritized nationalism and electoral politics over jihad, or holy war. Hamas is focused on the creation of an independent Palestinian state rather than al-Qaida's vision of a worldwide Muslim community ruled by Islamic law. Like al-Qaida, the Palestinian movement advocates violence to achieve its goal, but has also participated in elections alongside the moderate Palestinian Fatah group. "We caution some of the Islamic groups, among them Hamas, which are risking the...

VIENNA, Austria - The head of the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog criticized U.S. moves to assist in the supply of weapons to its allies in the Middle East, saying the money would be better spent on regional development projects. In an interview with the Austrian newsweekly Profil, to be published Monday, Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, said a U.S. strategy to support a weapons buildup in countries such as Israel, Saudi Arabia and Egypt was not helpful for improving security in the Middle East. "Pouring more money into arms is not going to resolve the...

MEXICO CITY - A U.S. plan to expand fences along the Mexican border to stem illegal immigration is an insult to all Latin Americans, Argentine President Nestor Kirchner said Tuesday during a visit to Mexico. "It's not just an insult to our sister nation of Mexico, but to all the nations of Latin America and all the nations of the world," the leftist president said to the applause of Mexican lawmakers. President Bush and Congress have approved plans for a 700-mile fence along the border. The Department of Homeland Security is committed to completing 370 miles by the end of...

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa, July 19 — Saying he still believes that the United States is safer than it was on Sept. 11, Rudolph W. Giuliani on Thursday nevertheless criticized the way the Bush Administration pursued Al Qaeda and suggested that the United States failed to put enough pressure on Pakistan to pursue terrorists. In two interviews while campaigning in Iowa, Mr. Giuliani discussed the National Intelligence Estimate released Tuesday by the White House, which found that a hands-off approach by Pakistan’s president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, toward Pakistan’s tribal areas had set the stage for Al Qaeda’s resurgence. “Did we not...

KEOKUK, Iowa - Democratic presidential contender Hillary Rodham Clinton drew a distinction between President Bush's decision to commute the sentence of White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby — which she has harshly criticized — and her husband's 140 pardons in his closing hours in office. "I believe that presidential pardon authority is available to any president, and almost all president's have exercised it," Clinton said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. "This (the Libby decision) was clearly an effort to protect the White House. ... There isn't any doubt now, what we know is that Libby was...

BAGHDAD - Former Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite just back from barnstorming for support among Sunni Arab leaders across the Middle East, appears determined to make another run at the premiership. His platform: Iraq cannot survive under the current Shiite leadership, and Sunnis must have a much larger role in government. The Sunni-dominated Arab League believes this, as well, but the idea is opposed by the Shiite-led government in Iraq. Most Shiite lawmakers cannot abide Allawi's secular positions and it appears unlikely he could form a sufficiently large parliamentary coalition to retake the prime minister's office. Iraq's...

HAMPSTEAD, N.H. - Mitt Romney suggested last week that he and his fellow Republican presidential contenders would avoid the "rancor" that flared between Democrats after one of Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record)'s fundraisers questioned Hillary Rodham Clinton's honesty. This week, with polls showing him running third, the former Massachusetts governor took sharper aim at his leading rivals, Sen. John McCain (news, bio, voting record) of Arizona and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani. McCain, Romney told New Hampshire voters on Thursday, was devising an immigration policy that was the "wrong course" for the nation. And Giuliani's positions on abortion,...

SACRAMENTO Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Democratic Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez appeared to forge an especially effective political bond over the past year, working together on landmark efforts to rebuild California's infrastructure and tackle global warming. Privately, however, the Republican governor believed Nunez was at times a passionless and thin-skinned political operator who would tell Schwarzenegger one thing behind closed doors and say something else in public, according to audio recordings released late Sunday. "Fabian is so much a what do you call it? A political operator, coming from the union background," Schwarzenegger said during a conversation about negotiations over infrastructure...

NAIROBI, Kenya - Secretary-General Kofi Annan told the U.N. conference on climate change Wednesday that those who would deny global warming or delay taking action against it are "out of step" and "out of time." "Let no one say we cannot afford to act," Annan declared. The United States is among those who contend that reducing global-warming gases would set back economies too much. The U.N. chief lamented "a frightening lack of leadership" in fashioning next steps in reducing global emissions. "I would want leaders around the world to really show courage and to know that if they do, their...

UNITED NATIONS - The United States sharply criticized the new U.N. Human Rights Council on Friday, calling it a "disappointment" and saying it has failed to address serious violations in its first few months of operation — particularly in Sudan's Darfur region. Sudan responded with a harsh condemnation of the U.S. human rights record and said Washington had no right to judge the effectiveness of the U.N. agency. The barbs came during the Human Rights Council's first annual report to the General Assembly. The U.S. is not a member of the council, which was created earlier this year to replace...

WASHINGTON A federally funded California nonprofit that gives legal help to Central Valley farmworkers and others violated federal prohibitions against political behavior, soliciting clients and other activities, an inspector general's report said Thursday. The report was requested by Republican Rep. Devin Nunes of Tulare, who's been critical of California Rural Legal Assistance and also of the federal Legal Services Corporation that funds it. The report found that California Rural Legal Assistance, which claims to provide free legal help to 20,000 poor rural Californians each year, apparently flouted congressional reforms blocking actions like lobbying and advocacy, getting involved in class-action litigation...

After a helicopter tour of the U.S.-Mexico border here, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger launched a broadside yesterday against House Republican leaders for threatening to scuttle a sweeping overhaul of immigration laws. “It would be totally inexcusable for them to say, 'This year we couldn't do it,'” Schwarzenegger said at a news conference minutes after landing near the border fence, yards away from Tijuana, on a National Guard Blackhawk helicopter. The Republican governor had just completed a 23-minute aerial tour that took him from Brown Field east nearly to Otay Mountain and then west to seaside Border Field State Park. After landing...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger sharply criticized the Bush administration Saturday for refusing his request to declare a pre-emptive federal disaster for California's fragile levees. President Bush offered California some aid Friday, issuing a rare directive letting the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers help with badly needed levee repairs. "I think the response that the federal government has given us is unacceptable," the governor told reporters at an Earth Day event on a San Pedro beach. "We need the federal government to come in and help us so we can build the levees as quickly as possible." Schwarzenegger said the state would...

NEW YORK - Democratic Sen. John Kerry, a potential 2008 candidate, lashed out at former rival George W. Bush and his advisers on Friday, calling them incompetent and labeling the White House team "the Katrina administration." "These guys are the most incompetent people I've ever seen in Washington in all the time I've been in public life," Kerry said via teleconference to the National Action Network, an advocacy group founded by Al Sharpton. "The problem with it is their incompetence is hurting people, it's hurting real people." Kerry criticized a House bill that would punish those who aid illegal immigrants...

HARARE, Zimbabwe - Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe criticized his nation's tiny white community Friday, saying few were repentant of colonial-era injustices against blacks or had integrated with blacks. Mugabe said he and veterans of the guerrilla war that ended white rule and led to independence in 1980 were determined to fight "to the end" unrepentant whites who still believed in the supremacy of their race. "White supremacists refuse to accept the equality of mankind," Mugabe told mourners at the state funeral of assistant police commissioner Winston Changara, 52, a former fighter in the independence war, who died in Harare on...

TORONTO - An investigative report on a corruption scandal that nearly toppled Canada's minority government cleared the prime minister Tuesday of any wrongdoing but held his predecessor accountable for misspending tens of millions of dollars in public funds. There is no evidence that former Prime Minister Jean Chretien was personally aware of a kickbacks scheme orchestrated by Quebec businessmen, Justice John Gomery concluded in a report released after a 20-month investigation. But Chretien must bear political responsibility for a program he created that allowed senior members of his Liberal Party to funnel millions of dollars into their Quebec coffers, Gomery...

UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The United States strongly criticized a revised blueprint charting reforms of the United Nations on Tuesday, saying the document is too long, poorly organized and doesn't focus on President Bush's main concerns. Britain's U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry, speaking on behalf of the European Union, reacted far more favorably. He called the latest draft a good basis for the final document and said he hoped much of it was in its final form. Diplomats have haggled for weeks over the language of the draft outcome document which is supposed to be approved by world leaders at...

Boxer criticizes Iraq war in SF speech 'Our troops deserve more,' senator says Bay City News Wednesday, July 6, 2005 Sen. Barbara Boxer offered a major foreign policy speech on the war in Iraq before hundreds of her constituents in San Francisco today. The situation in Iraq is spiraling out of control, she said, and the pool of people willing to fight in the insurgency against American troop presence there seems bottomless. She described herself as "distressed, angry and frustrated'' over the continuing unrest in Iraq and the mounting death toll with no apparent end in sight. "Iraq was a...

SHANGHAI, July 4 -- The Chinese government on Monday sharply criticized the United States for threatening to erect barriers aimed at preventing the attempted takeover of the American oil company Unocal by one of China's three largest energy firms, CNOOC Ltd.Four days after the U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a resolution urging the Bush administration to block the proposed transaction as a threat to national security, China's Foreign Ministry excoriated Congress for injecting politics into what it characterized as a standard business matter. "We demand that the U.S. Congress correct its mistaken ways of politicizing economic and trade issues...

MADRID, Spain (AP) - The Spanish government in power at the time of the Madrid train bombings underestimated threats from Islamic militants and responded to the massacre by misleading voters in the face of an imminent election, a panel of lawmakers said Wednesday. Seven of eight parties represented in Spain's Parliament voted Wednesday to approve a 300-page report investigating the March 11, 2004, attacks, which killed 191 people and wounded more than 1,500. The conservative Popular Party - which ruled at the time of the attack and which was blamed in the report for releasing misleading information - abstained from...

UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Washington isn't taking "the common bargain" of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty as seriously as it once did, and that's dimming global support for the U.S. campaign to shut down the North Korean and Iranian nuclear programs, the former chief U.N. weapons inspector said. Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton, by questioning the value of treaties and international law, has also damaged the U.S. position, Hans Blix said. "There is a feeling the common edifice of the international community is being dismantled," the Swedish arms expert said. Blix, now chairman of the Swedish government-sponsored Weapons of Mass...

HAVANA (AP) - Cuban President Fidel Castro criticized the Organization of American States and its new Chilean secretary-general, accusing him of using "insolent, interventionist" language to suggest change is needed in communist Cuba. Castro used a three-hour appearance on Cuban state television late Wednesday to lambaste the United States and several other governments around the region that he said were servile toward the United States. Jose Miguel Insulza, a former socialist interior minister in Chile, was widely considered the third and last choice of U.S. officials in the months-long struggle for leadership of the OAS. But Castro appeared to be...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) - Former President Clinton lashed out at the Bush administration's energy policies Friday, criticizing them as "dumb economics" during a wide-ranging speech to a friendly crowd at Brown University. But Clinton encouraged Americans to support democracy in Iraq, and said they should encourage the Bush administration to work with the rest of the world in bringing peace to the region. The former president said those who opposed going to war with Iraq had to put those feelings aside. "You should want it to work now," he said. Clinton - received enthusiastically by more than 4,000 students, politicians...

HAVANA - President Fidel Castro on Sunday mocked the European Union for failing to back Cuba's call for a U.N. investigation into U.S. treatment of terror suspects at the Guantanamo Bay. Cuba asked the U.N. Human Rights Commission in Geneva last week to ask Washington to authorize an independent investigation into the situation at the U.S. naval base in eastern Cuba. Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque called on European nations to back the resolution asking for an inquiry. The European Union "does not have any intention of doing so," EU spokeswoman Krisztina Nagy said. Castro scorned the rejection Sunday....

UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The embattled head of the United Nations' internal watchdog on Friday bitterly criticized a decision to launch an outside review of allegations that he showed favoritism in recruiting and promoting employees. Dileep Nair, head of Office of Internal Oversight Services, released a statement saying he was the victim of a smear campaign by the U.N. staff union designed to discredit his office. The favoritism charge is separate from a complaint made against Nair earlier in the week by the independent committee probing allegations of misconduct in the world body's defunct oil-for-food program in Iraq. That report...

STANFORD, Calif. (AP) - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger criticized state unions for not acting in the public interest and said he does not have a gripe with nurses or teachers, just the unions that represent them. In an interview on MSNBC's "Hardball," California's Republican governor complained about a state law that prohibits schools from contracting out to mow lawns, repair roofs and do other fixes at schools. "It cost the California school system, our education system, $300 million extra," Schwarzenegger said. "Do you think that's to the public's interest or is it to the unions' interest? Think about that." The California...

SACRAMENTO - The day after Arnold Schwarzenegger launched an initiative drive to remake public pensions, a prominent ally of President George Bush attacked the plan and pleaded with the GOP governor to pursue an alternative. Forcing new public employees to move to a 401(k)-style pension system -- in which they would invest their own money and assume the risk of playing the stock market -- would hurt the University of California's ability to attract top talent, said Gerald Parsky, chairman of UC's Board of Regents. The proposal is one of three ``reforms'' that Schwarzenegger said Tuesday he wants to take...

A union representing some of University of California's lowest-paid workers will rally in San Francisco next week to protest what it says are $2.4 million in bonuses recently handed out to medical center administrators. Workers represented by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299 called the bonuses "outrageous" when other employees haven't received raises for two years and student fees are going up. A UC statement said the bonuses are in keeping with an incentive plan in place since 1992. Executives receive base salary plus an incentive award based on performance. "The incentive compensation is a...

U.N. Criticizes Iraq Occupation Oil Sales By WARREN HOGE Published: December 15, 2004 UNITED NATIONS, Dec. 14 - An audit board set up by the Security Council to monitor oil sales in Iraq reported Tuesday that during the 15 months that the United States-led occupation authority ran the country there was widespread mismanagement, including financial irregularities, a failure to curb smuggling and overdependence on no-bid contracts. The watchdog panel, the International Advisory and Monitoring Board of the Development Fund for Iraq, cited three main concerns over oil sales under the Coalition Provisional Authority: the absence of metering to keep track...

SANTA FE, N.M. - Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards (news - web sites) has sharpened his criticism of President Bush (news - web sites) and Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) over the past week, but his style has remained the same. He couches his criticism with charm. The North Carolina senator with the Southern drawl and populist message is no pit bull on the campaign trail, the role that vice presidential candidates sometimes take as they do the dirty work for the No. 1 on the ticket. Rather, Edwards draws distinctions between John Kerry (news -...

Gore Criticizes Bush's Faith - Liberal Intolerance by Sharon Hughes September 11, 2004 I remember years ago seeing Al Gore on television promoting his book, Earth in the Balance - Ecology and the Human Spirit, and Tipper talking about her concern of the effects rock and roll music was having on teenagers. Back then, before he was Vice President, they talked about themselves as being born again Southern Baptist Christians. However, after reading Al Gore's comments in this week's New Yorker magazine about George W. Bush's faith, it appears things have changed. As reported by David Remnick in the New...

Washington — As a Democratic commissioner on the Federal Communications Commission, I may not agree with many positions taken by speakers this week at the Republican National Convention. Even so, I believe our broadcast media owe us more coverage of an event that remains an important component of the presidential campaign. Yet tonight, if people around the country tune in to the commercial broadcast TV networks, most will not see any live convention coverage. That's not right.

PENSACOLA, Fla. - President Bush (news - web sites) criticized Democratic rival John Kerry (news - web sites) on Tuesday for saying he would still have voted to authorize the war in Iraq (news - web sites) even if he had known that no weapons of mass destruction would be found. "Almost 220 days after switching positions to declare himself the anti-war candidate, my opponent has found a new nuance," saying he "now agrees it was the right decision to go into Iraq," Bush told several thousand cheering supporters in the Florida Panhandle, a heavily military area. "After months of...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Democrat John Kerry (news - web sites), making a northbound pilgrimage to the Democratic National Convention, said Monday he hasn't seen the United States such a target of world animosity since the Vietnam War era. On the opening day of the convention that will make him the party's presidential nominee, Kerry underscored its theme that America can be both stronger at home and respected abroad. He criticized President Bush (news - web sites) as having an almost exclusively military response to Sept. 11. "Never in 35 years have I seen the United States as much the...

FULTON, Mo. - Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) said Monday that John Kerry (news - web sites) "has given us ample grounds to doubt" his judgment on national security even as the Democratic National Committee (news - web sites) chairman urged the White House to stop such attacks. "Call off the Republican attack dogs," DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe told reporters in Washington. Half a country away, Cheney told a friendly crowd at Westminster College that Kerry wavered in views to oust Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) as well as the strength of the Persian...

WASHINGTON - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites) on Wednesday marked the first anniversary of the war in Iraq (news - web sites) by criticizing President Bush (news - web sites) for failed policies "with no end in sight" as Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) defended the administration. "Today we know that the mission is not finished, hostilities have not ended, and our men and women in uniform fight on almost alone with the target squarely on their backs," Kerry said at George Washington University. "Every day they face danger and death from suicide...

WASHINGTON - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry on Monday criticized President Bush's record on homeland security, saying his Republican rival is "big on bluster and short on action" in protecting the nation. Speaking to the International Association of Firefighters, a 263,000-member union that has endorsed his candidacy, the four-term Massachusetts senator argued that Bush talks tough on terrorism but has failed to back it up with the financial resources firefighters and other first responders need. "I do not fault George Bush for doing too much in the war on terror, I believe he's done too little," Kerry said. "I think...

Bush Criticizes Japan, China on Currency By DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - China and Japan should stop intervening in the currency markets to give themselves an unfair trade advantage, President Bush said Tuesday, the eve of a nine-day trip through Asia. "Markets ought to be determining respective currencies," Bush said in an interview with Asian journalists. The president's trip, which begins Wednesday, takes him to Japan, the Philippines, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia and Australia. He will meet with the leaders of China, Mexico and South Korea in Bangkok on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, which runs...

Dean walks the line on firearms By Sam Hemingway Free Press Staff Writer Democratic presidential contender Howard Dean has a ready answer for voters who think his opposition to the Iraq war and support for homosexual rights make him an ultra-liberal. "I've been endorsed by the National Rifle Association," Dean tells audiences at almost every stop, referring to NRA's support of him when he was Vermont's governor for 11 years. That statement is true, but an examination of Dean's record on gun issues in Vermont suggests his relationship with the NRA in his home state has been more platonic than...

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - The nation's oldest Hispanic civil rights group called on Arnold Schwarzenegger to step down from the advisory board of U.S. English, a group that seeks to make English the official language of the United States. AP Photo The League of United Latin American Citizens said the Austrian-born actor's position brings into question his commitment to Hispanics. "It just seems like all the issues that we support he doesn't," Gabriela Lemus, the league's director of policy and legislation, said Thursday. The league said it is not taking a position on whether Gov. Gray Davis (news - web sites)...

<p>SACRAMENTO (AP) - Accusing Republicans of blocking a budget solution, Gov. Gray Davis said Wednesday that lawmakers should drop all other business and put off plans for summer recess until a spending plan is adopted.</p> <p>Davis, who has stepped up his criticism of the GOP in the last week, made his strongest comments to date even as he prepared to meet with party leaders on the budget crisis behind closed doors later today.</p>

MIAMI BEACH, Fla. - Three of the Democrats' nine presidential contenders drew the wrath of the president of the NAACP on Monday for skipping the group's candidate forum, reflecting a growing sentiment among blacks that their loyalty to the Democratic Party is being taken for granted. The six Democratic presidential hopefuls shared the stage with four empty chairs, each labeled with the name of a White House candidate who didn't make it. They were President Bush (news - web sites) and Democrats Joe Lieberman (news - web sites), Dick Gephardt (news - web sites) and Dennis Kucinich. While Bush's absence...

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. -- A judge in Portsmouth Wednesday acquitted a Maine man of drug charges, calling a police search that led to the arrest an outrageous violation of constitutional rights. Portsmouth District Court Judge Sharon DeVries refused to allow certain evidence to be used and cleared 20-year-old Joshua Eastman, of South Portland, Maine, of marijuana possession. He was arrested after police responded to a noise complaint at an apartment in January, stood outside the door for about a half hour and heard what they said sounded like juveniles talking about drugs and alcohol. After no one answered their knocks, officers...